‘When I heard the news my heart sank’

CATHOLIC women’s rights activists reacted with dismay to the election of conservative German Joseph Ratzinger as Pope Benedict XVI.

"When I heard the announcement, my heart sank, quite frankly," Sister Maureen Fiedler of We Are Church, a global movement of Catholics committed to renewal, said after the 78-year-old Ratzinger was elected.

"One of the major changes I would have hoped for in a new Pope was an openness to women," said Fiedler, a member of the Sisters of Loretto order. "He simply has no record that would suggest that he's open ... to more than 50% of the Catholic community, to more than 50% of the world," she said.

Another leading women's activist in the Church, Benedictine Sister Joan Chittister, said the new Pope had a "limited" understanding of women's issues. "To be honest, at a moment like this, the only reaction that anyone can have is hope.

"The history of this Pope's understanding of women is a limited one," she said, recalling a letter to bishops penned by Ratzinger in July 2004.

In the letter "on the Collaboration of Men and Women in the Church and in the World", Ratzinger argued against the ordination of women as priests and said claiming no differences exist between male and female had had "lethal effects", particularly on the family.

The Women's Ordination Conference (WOC), a leading Catholic organisation working for women priests, also reacted with concern.

"When our Church desperately needed a healer, the cardinals elected Ratzinger well known for being divisive in the Church," stated Joy Barnes, executive director of the WOC. "We need a Pope who will build a bridge between progressive and orthodox Catholics, but based on Ratzinger's hard-lined record, it is doubtful that this will become a reality.

"This is another example of how the hierarchy is out of touch with Catholics in the pews.

"Cardinal Ratzinger's election as Pope will galvanise faithful Catholics to work even more passionately for a renewed priesthood that includes women," Aisha Taylor, WOC's programme director, asserted. "We pray for Pope Benedict XVI to lead the Catholic Church toward reconciliation for the Church's sins of abuse, sexism, racism, heterosexism and all oppression. We trust the Holy Spirit will continue to work in our church to fulfil Jesus' radical message of justice."